Secondary Transition Services Awards
Nominations are now being accepted for this year’s Arizona Secondary Transition Services Awards!
On behalf of the Arizona Department of Education, Exceptional Student Services, and other partnering agencies, you are invited to submit your nominations for this year's Secondary Transition Services Awards, which will be presented at Arizona's 2025 IDEA Conference.
Your nomination is important to recognize the secondary transition contributions and successes happening across Arizona. To nominate a youth/young adult, community member, and/or educator for their exceptional efforts, please submit an online nomination form.
Nomination categories:
- Youth/Young Adult: A youth or recently graduated young adult who has benefited from successful secondary transition services.
- Community Member: An individual (employee, manager, owner of a community business, etc.) who provides exemplary support for students and/or young adults with disabilities to enhance community-based experiences and opportunities.
- Educator: A PEA or Secure Care certified staff, classified staff, support staff member, related service provider, or administrator who provides remarkable secondary transition services.
For each nomination, you must provide basic demographic information about the candidate’s background, strengths, and his or her outstanding participation in the secondary transition process.
We encourage you to nominate multiple individuals across all categories. Please do not nominate programs or groups for any of the award categories, as we wish to recognize people for their individual efforts.
All nominations submitted on or before Friday, May 2, 2025, will be considered. Award winners will be selected and notified in July.
If you have any questions, please email the IDEA Conference inbox.
2024 Secondary Transition Services Award Winners
Samantha Cathcart: Youth/Young Adult Award Winner
Samantha is a 17-year-old 12th-grade student at Kingman High School with Multiple disabilities including Orthopedic Impairment, Mild Intellectual Disability, Other Health Impairment, and Speech/Language Impairment. Sammie's goal after graduating is to be an advocate or caretaker for others. She hopes to be an advocate for individuals with disabilities and gain on-the-job training in disability law.
Sammie is a ray of sunshine for everyone she meets. She is an advocate for herself and others within the school. She remains positive even through her challenges. She is a class helper and wants to ensure everyone is successful. She works closely with the school and her parents.
Sammie worked closely with the district's special education transition coordinator and her teacher to express her post-secondary goals. She helped describe what she sees herself doing after high school and how to achieve it. She has thoughts on how to become a paraeducator to support student growth and advocacy.
Sammie has practiced cooking in the classroom to help increase her self-care. She works as an aide for the teacher in her classroom. She works with her fellow students to find needs for them and advocates for those needs to teachers and administration. She has even considered presenting at a local board meeting.
Luke Parker: Community Member Award Winner
Luke has been a dedicated Adaptive Recreation professional since starting as a Special Olympics Arizona volunteer at 15 years old. He holds bachelor’s degrees in Kinesiology and Psychology and completed specific coursework in Therapeutic Recreation to be eligible to become a Certified Therapeutic Recreation Specialist (CTRS). Working for the City of Peoria’s Adaptive Recreation Department for over 10 years, Luke had the pleasure of working in an established, extraordinarily successful Adaptive program in a variety of settings: Special Olympics sports, DDD licensed programs, creative and performing arts and so much more. Some of his favorite experiences over the years were helping teach an adaptive theater class and taking a Special Olympics flag football team to the USA Games in Florida in 2022.
In July 2023, Luke moved west to join the City of Goodyear as their first Adaptive Recreation Coordinator, responsible for starting an Adaptive Recreation program in Goodyear. The goals of the Goodyear Adaptive program are going to be focusing on the whole lifespan, placing a priority on early childhood and adolescence and the transition into the community post-high school.
Luke is excited about this new chapter and looks forward to expanding adaptive programming options in the West Valley.
Jennifer Muñoz: Educator Award Winner
Jennifer Muñoz has dedicated over 20 years to working with students with exceptionalities. She began her career as a teacher at Phoenix Union, where she made significant strides in redesigning the Enterprise Transition program at Metro Tech High School. Currently, Jennifer serves as a transition coordinator at Tempe High School. In this role, she assists students and their families in navigating the transition from school to career, college, and life ensuring they have the support and resources needed for success. Many years from now when Jennifer is done with the world of education, she hopes to run a Burmese cat rescue in honor of the best cat in the world, Zac. In the meantime, she will continue supporting her students and living happily ever after with her wife, Trisha, and their two kids Lennox and Via.
Maggie Gedebou: Educator Award Winner
Maggie Gedebou is a dedicated educator and transition specialist with over twenty years of experience in special education, vocational training, and program coordination. She holds a Severe and Profoundly Disabled Special Education Certification (K-12) from the Arizona Department of Education and earned her Master of Arts in Education from the University of Arizona in 2001, specializing in Special Education, Rehabilitation, and In School Psychology, with a focus in Severe and Profound Disabilities. Her commitment to academic excellence is underscored by her induction into the Golden Key International Honor Society during both her undergraduate and graduate studies.
In her current role as the Exceptional Education Program Manager for Tucson Unified School District's Community Transition Programs, Maggie coordinates and manages programs such as Transition from School to Work (TSW), Advanced Community Training (ACT), Project FOCUS, and Project SEARCH. Her responsibilities include fiscal planning, budget management, program evaluation, and collaboration with external agencies to facilitate smooth transitions for students from school to the workforce.
In 2008, Maggie established a significant collaboration between the Tucson Unified School District and the Ben's Bells Project by initiating an Arizona Learn and Serve Grant to create kindness-themed mosaic murals. To date, over 300 murals have been installed across the nation. This collaboration evolved into the Kind Stitches program, which she developed to provide students with disabilities the opportunity to gain valuable vocational skills in retail, customer service, apparel design, and embroidery machine operation.
Maggie's dedication to inclusive education is evident from her previous roles as an Exceptional Education Teacher at Winston Churchill High School and Rincon High School. There, she provided direct instruction to students with autism spectrum disorder and severe disabilities, utilizing community-based instruction, behavior support plans, and assistive technology to enhance learning outcomes. At Rincon High School, Maggie implemented a progressive inclusion model that integrated students with significant disabilities into general education classrooms alongside their peers. She also taught in the ACT program for ten years, providing vocational training in community settings and collaborating with local businesses to offer meaningful learning experiences.
Additionally, Maggie's experience extends beyond traditional educational settings. In 2010, as a Program Collaborator for Project FOCUS at the University of Arizona, she played a key role in designing and implementing a comprehensive program supporting students with intellectual disabilities in higher education. Her contributions included grant preparation, strategic planning, and collaboration with diverse stakeholders to achieve program objectives. Maggie's career demonstrates her dedication to empowering students with significant disabilities and creating inclusive educational environments.
